[MD] Sin Part 1

[Case]

[Platt]
Government cannot spend what it hasn't borrowed, taxed or otherwise
fleeced from productive members of society.  

[Case]
Taxation has been used from the dawn of time to invest in public resources
and the pay for projects in the public interest. Get used to it.

[Platt]
Do you want bureaucrats in the public or private sector setting values.
Or elected government officials? Not me. For example, elected officials
determine the value of money. Look what has happened to its value in
the last 100 years.

[Case]
In our society is it the job of the legislature to establish public
priorities and to set the rules of the game. This is explained at
considerable length in the Constitution.

[Platt]
There are various totalitarian regimes whose economic systems
do not recognize the concept of private property, communism being the
most recent. 

[Case]
You seem to know more about communism than I do but I recall people in
communist Russia standing in line for toilet paper. Once they got their roll
is was theirs. It became private property.
 
[Platt]
You omitted the part in the Declaration about the right to overthrow
the government (anti-collectivism) when it fails to secure and promote
the individual rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
And, as the preamble to the Constitution states, the proper function of
government is to "secure the blessings of liberty." Liberty from what?
You guessed it -- a government that becomes destructive of individual
rights!  Leading me to suggest you leftist collectivist leanings are
outright Anti-American. So there.

[Case]
As I mentioned the Declaration was not the law of the land but even the
passage you mention claims a collective right not an individual right to
over through the government. Are you suggesting that the current government
it corrosive to individual rights? Are you advocating the overthrow of our
government?
    
[Platt]
Scary? If it wasn't for the concept of a corporation you would be still
be digging potatoes like most of the peasants throughout history.

[Case]
Yes, granting personhood to a social institution is scary. I am not alone.
As I said before, Jefferson and Adam Smith were both fearful of the
unrestrained accumulation of economic power this represents.

"I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed
corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of
strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country."
- Thomas Jefferson, 1812

"The directors of such [joint-stock] companies, however, being the managers
rather of other people's money than of their own, it cannot well be
expected, that they should watch over it with the same anxious vigilance
with which the partners in a private copartnery frequently watch over their
own.... Negligence and profusion, therefore, must always prevail, more or
less, in the management of the affairs of such a company."
-Adam Smith - The Wealth of Nations

[Platt]
Then how come researchers and academics are always begging government
for more handouts?

[Case]
You can haggle this one our with Arlo if you like I can only add that much
of the research which fueled the economy of the western world for the past
50 years was conducted at public expense. As you say practitioners of pure
scientific research are now reduced to begging for handouts. There is no
cleared example of the poverty of conservative thought.

[Platt]
Ever hear of private non-profit organizations?

[Case]
Yes, these are economic entities for whom money is a means not an end. I
hold them if very high regard. So does the governments. Many grants for
public projects and services can only be awarded to non-profits. In this
Christmas season I encourage everyone to toss a few extra bucks into the
Salvation Army's kettles.

[Platt]
So now you are anti-profit, too? Why don't you just admit you want
to live in a communist state and be done with it?

[Case said earlier]
I am not saying that waste doesn't exist or that profit is bad or that
people shouldn't squeeze whatever they can out of the system. But waste is a
fact of life not the ultimate evil.

[Case]
I don't have anything to add to what I originally said on this other than to
point out that I am not the one advocating the overthrow of the government.

[Platt]
Oh, so now you realize the hole you were digging. Now profit is a "fact
of life" -- right? I wonder if "facts of life" can be considered
immoral. Interesting question don't you think? How does the MOQ answer?

[Case] 
When money becomes an end in itself rather than a means to an end I consider
it immoral. Capitalism succeeds because it appeals to individual greed and
selfishness. I accept this as a "fact of life". It is tacky but not
necessarily immoral. In any event I certainly would not elevate it to the
status of Virtue.